


Amalgamation

by ketherphorbia



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Cracked Gems, Gem Fusion, Gem Kindergarten, Gemsonas - Freeform, Gen, M/M, Other, Roughhousing, gem body horror, male gems
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-18
Updated: 2017-09-20
Packaged: 2018-06-09 05:05:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6891355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ketherphorbia/pseuds/ketherphorbia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An instability colony of radioactive and otherwise highly toxic gems populate an asteroid, set to the task of sustaining a primitive Kindergarten without the use of industrial equipment. Under Blue Diamond’s orders, these fundamentally-defective gems must prove their only perceivable value to her as mechanical labor. [Set shortly after the flashback in “The Answer,” while later chapters will be set around the time of the first half of Season One. Many of the gems in this story use male pronouns, their gender differentiation based on their toxicity in base state.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

“C’mere.”

The whisper ushered Galena to follow it around the bend of the mineshaft. Resonance gauge in hand, the lead-tone gem complied, the voice familiar but the cause uncertain. He hadn’t been having all that much luck locating a fresh enough signature anyway. Upon rounding the corner, Torbernite lunged to pin him to the shaft wall, managing to grab the hand which held the device and hold it over Galena’s head.

“I wanna try something,” the taller chartreuse gem muttered with a characteristic petty playfulness. Everything about this desolate asteroid wrought a cynicism, a fatigue, and one could hear it in any gem sequestered there, yet Torbernite’s voice held a certain restless animation in addition to it.

The shorter gem glanced up at the other with an uncertainty salted equally with curiosity and trust, the look in his dull grey-blue eyes suggesting a further explanation was expected.

“What’ve you heard about the Amalgamation?”

Galena instantly understood what Torbernite was getting at, his pale face flushing blue.

“She… she’s a monstrosity, an  _abomination_.” Galena poorly feigned a slow shake of his head, an attempt at batting away his chartreuse comrade’s very suggestion. “Blue Diamond decreed they were traitors to the Empire, and defectors of her Court. …There… there’s a reason…  _that’s_  forbidden, Torbernite…”

“Isn’t that what we are, though?” He let go of Galena’s thin wrists, then put his own hands flush to the wall behind Galena’s head to keep him looking at him. “ _Abominations_? To use your own words…”

“This is an Instability Colony. It’s… different… We’re… different.”

“The Amalgamation isn’t so different from us. The fact that…  _heterogeneous_  fusion happened, it proves that it can and does happen. And we, we’re living proof that instability can and does happen. We aren’t supposed to happen. But we do. And she wasn’t supposed to happen, and she does.” The look in his olive eyes held a wry smirk, his birth-marked chin quivering slightly. “I’ve overheard Orpiments up top talking about how to fuse. We should try it.”

“How? How is it even possible…?” Galena had heard of the chaotic event where a Sapphire and one of her Rubies had somehow managed to fuse, but it neither sat well with him nor felt like a complete picture of the whole story. Everything he knew of Homeworld proved it was impossible. Yet…

“Different gems have different resonant signatures, and the only way it could have happened was if those signatures were capable of harmonizing. An overlay of the two crystalline matrices… Different gems have different resonant signatures. You resonate with Galenas, and I’d resonate with other Torbernites. The only way the heterogeneous fusion could have happened was if those different signatures were capable of harmonizing. An overlay of the two crystalline matrices… A new gem out of two, instead of an iteration through uniformity.” Galena’s face fell slack, and Torbernite stepped back from him with a chuckle and an outreached hand. “A demonstration’ll do better.”

Rather than take Torbernite’s hand, Galena brushed the long forked dark bangs from his face and hesitantly held the resonance gauge up to it. Torbernite smirked at the scientific, cautious approach. It chirped to an erratic rhythm, but a rhythm nonetheless. Somewhere between eight and fifteen patterns, and after a moment of trying to understand it, he held it up to his own hand, finding a similar irregularity to the results, a mere two to five range. Torbernite’s had been a single octave higher, more like clicking than Galena’s dull thrumming. To each a pulse, nonetheless. Not only were they two different types of gem–they were also two different types of unstable. And yet, Galena knew: Torbernite understood this but desired to try anyway. A Ruby and Sapphire, they were at least related, both types of Corundum. If any unlike gem were to be capable of doing it, they would have to be of the same crystalline category, and Torbernite was a phosphate, while Galena was a sulfide. Yet despite this, theoretically, an  _overlay_  as the explanation Torbernite had proposed seemed plausible if not unlikely. He set down the diagnostic device and took Torbernite’s hand. But he could neither resist his elder’s instruction nor resist the desire to humor him.

“What now?” He knew the answer, but couldn’t resist the rhetoric either.

“We get to know one another even more intimately than before.”


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The UN18474 kindergarten of asteroid AG9KF07 works on excavating a brand new and unknown specimen of gem, Sperrylite, and all hell breaks loose.

The entire Kindergarten of Asteroid AG9KF07-UN18474 was set to a single task. All other excavations had halted, this single prospect taking precedence over all else. Pallasite, the tall, booming Pyroxene overseer of the quarry, had given little detail about what was so special about the gem soon to emerge from the site–only the 257-hour time-frame in which the quarry had to work, and the soon-nascent gem’s specimen,  _Sperrylite_. No one in the quarry had ever heard that name before, and speculation ran wild what such a gem might be like. All the workers had to go on was the resonance gauge’s indication of the type of instability Sperrylite exhibited–characteristic of a heavy metal gem.

A mixture of two dozen REOs, flushed Euxenite and ruddy Monazite, held the excavation line, utilizing their radiation emissions to etch safe fracture lines in the quarry shaft. Right behind them followed the lead oxides ashen Massicot and rusty Litharge, utilizing their hook-like gem tools to scale the walls and chip away where indicated. The mustard-colored arsenide Orpiments heaved away the waste rock with the use of their rope-like gem tools.

“FORM OF THREE.”

Pallasite’s voice boomed characteristically throughout the teeming excavation site, the force of her diaphragm amplified by the solar plexus position of her gem. She stood a hundred meters back from the work site, observing at a distance, her eyes discerning, her wiry metallic skin catching light from the star not far off. As a Pallasite, she was comprised of countless incompletely formed Peridots embedded in a stony-iron matrix, most densely concentrated at her waist, clustered around the one Olivine class gem that had successfully gestated fully. Her complexion projected the composite nature of her gem as a mottled appearance in her otherwise steely complexion, and she covered her physical form with a gauzy, flowing attire in shame; but, she did not hide her midriff while on AG9KF07, both embracing her appearance and using it as a scare tactic. These misfits had little concept of rare or composite gems. Here, she could own their revulsion, be in control of how they saw and understood her. Truly, the worker gems on the asteroid respected her and feared her in equal measure.

The workers knew her command could only mean one of two things–either they were close to completion, or there was an imminent danger someone further out could predict. Without hesitation, the boxy Massicots and Litharges and the lithe Orpiments piled in like groups, leaping atop one another and fusing to form specimens three times larger than any individual specimen. Never having witnessed a stable fusion, they could have never known superfluous limbs and eyes was uncharacteristic of a homogeneous fusion; yet despite this, the leaden Massicots and Litharges made use of their extra lines of vision and additional arms with aplomb, no longer required to scale as high up the quarry shaft to excavate higher, and the arsenide Orpiments effortlessly hefted away the hand-cut quarry tailings where they previously struggled. The lead oxides’ gem tools had formed three-pronged chicken sickles, while the arsenides’ tools had become enough lengths of rope to be capable of being easily knotted around the debris. Populating the deepest recess of the quarry shaft, the Euxenites and Monazites, irregularly shaped, also followed suit, now doing double duty with their focused and triplicate-amplified emissions functioning not much unlike broad laser force. These five specimen lines were accustomed to, practiced in, fusing to accomplish a task, and productivity burst forward at an even greater pace.

Galena, working with three other Galenas, monitored the resonance of the site, to supervise both that Sperrylite was still forming at the known rate and that excavation was not obstructing his formation. A low-ranking supervisor, chartreuse Torbernite held special jurisdiction over the smaller, less important resonance site directly above the Sperrylite site, to ensure its emergence did not interfere with Sperrylite’s. His rarity he made evident in the intricacy of his attire, a pale green and olive angular vest over a white bodysuit terminating in tall, bulky boots and fingerless gloves. It was his orders directly from Pallasite and Mystic Topaz themselves to sacrifice the emergence of all common specimens in conflict with the emergence of this rare one. Despite being a rare specimen himself, Torbernite disliked the very idea that a hundred Massicots might be less valuable to the Empire than this one Sperrylite. He knew for a fact Pallasite and Mystic Topaz were willfully withholding information about this emerging gem, but all he had to go on was Pallasite’s matron skill of speaking to the life-line of still-nascent gems–he knew that Pallasite had spoken to the unformed specimen since first contact, and that she knew what skills the specimen would provide. He had a gut feeling Sperrylite would be more pivotal than a Quartz class, considering all the fuss. But, he could hardly speculate or throw accusations about. Despite being in a position of authority, he was as far down on the leadership series as it got.

There was only one common class emergence Torbernite oversaw that day, and three of the Galenas at his employ were fast at the new Litharge site directly above Sperrylite’s at ground-level. The fourth, he kept at his side to monitor the heartline of the Sperrylite shaft. A conflict arose in the thin strata between the two shafts, a Euxenite fusion in Sperrylite’s becoming overzealous with the depth of his cutting.

“Torbernite! We have a problem!” a Galena called out from the mouth of the Litharge shaft. “It’s still two hours of excavation before we reach the new Litharge, but we aren’t going to make it!”

Pallasite turned to observe Torbernite’s next action, and at the outburst she was soon joined by Schorl, and Mystic Topaz and her Pearl. Schorl was stout but commanding, having been a member of Blue Diamond’s diplomatic security, and she stood a head shorter than Pallasite, but made up for it in sheer mass; the pitch-black gem was both a pillar and a wall. More perfect than even a Quartz class gem, however, the iridescent Mystic Topaz towered over everything else in the quarry, eye level with even the triplicate fusion workers. The asteroid workers knew very little about the facet-cut and imperious crystal, besides the rumor she had been transferred from Yellow Diamond’s Court to work under Blue Diamond; but, they knew for certain her Peacock Pearl was insufferable, and despised any interactions with the plaything. Pallasite may have had verbal authority over all that took place on AG9KF07, but it was crystal clear who was in control Pallasite. All four members of the asteroid’s makeshift court had their eyes solely on Torbernite, expectant for his next course of action.

With a grimace, Torbernite glanced to his favored Galena and nodded knowingly, and Galena understood.

“G-82, is the likelihood of the Litharge cave-in going to impact excavation of Sperrylite?”

With dread in his pale, leaden face, the Galena looked on to his superior.

“Continued excavation of Sperrylite will likely bring down the entire face of this end of the quarry. Fracture lines are already present from the current foundation level back almost a hundred meters.”

“G-80, G-81, and G-83!” Pallasite called out, insisting all three come forward to the mouth of the Litharge shaft. “Do your readings correspond to G-82′s!”

Before they could respond, a section of wall face sheared from a loss of integrity, and began to fall. Out of instinct, the Orpiments scrambled out of the way, letting it crash to the quarry bed and smash apart. The impact flung easily half of the golden fusions back, rendering them apart into a chaotic tumble of individual Orpiments, not much unlike the rock slide into pieces. They were slow to stand, reeling despite the urgency of another imminent shearing.

“DON’T STOP DIGGING!” Even at a bellow, Mystic Topaz’s voice was rich and deep, and few had ever actually heard her speak. “WE’LL PIERCE THE GESTATION CHAMBER BEFORE IT ALL GOES!”

“You heard Mystic Topaz!” Pallasite cried, wagging a finger like a maestro at her Orpiments. “Re-fuse! Scale the wall and try to hold the line as long as you possibly can! You owe it to your Topaz, and we all have a duty to Our Diamond! It is by her will!”

The Orpiments only lingered for mere moments, to brush debris from their saffron tunics and slick down their tallow, chin-length hair, before murmuring in a disjointed and variable unison “ _For Our Diamond_!” running together and forming multiply-fused Orpiments up to four- and five- deep. It didn’t take long before they took to the cliff face to catch any further rock slides, and tried to form a lattice-work with their golden ropes and extra limbs. Some of the five-deep Orpiments were so unstable their long bangs had receded to show their single cyclopean eye had as many pupils as the gems that comprised them.

Another deafening rumble was building up deep in the cliff face, and soon un-fused Massicots and Litharges were pouring out of the shaft entrance, some reporting becoming cracked from a second fracture line in the quarry giving in deeper inside the shaft. In a panicked chaos, two Massicots ran back toward the mouth of the shaft before grounding themselves, having grabbed as the third member of their fusion a Litharge who was just as disoriented. Though Massicots were dark grey and Litharges were rust-brown, the resultant fusion was bright red and overflowed with muscle mass. Two arms to one side, one to the other, with a star-crested hair line and flat-top. Where Litharge’s bodysuit had a single chevron pointing upward and Massicot’s a single downward, the fusion bore a pale red cross across his chest. Time slowed down as everyone who noticed the mistake stopped to gawk in horror at  _Minium_. Minium roared in a confused defiance, rushing headlong back into the cramped space of the shaft before too many took notice.

Where the overseers did not see what had taken place, Torbernite and Galena did. In the turmoil Galena had come closer to where Torbernite had stood, worried about his fellow Galenas in the upper shaft.

“It’s going to help, but I don’t think it’ll be enough,” Torbernite said, looking to the Sperrylite shaft.

“They’ve never worked together like this before,” Galena said, looking to the Litharge shaft.

They both had understood from the initial rock slide what it was they had to do, and as they both kept their eyes on the excavation sites, Torbernite took a few sweeping strides back behind Galena. Galena raised his hands above his head awaiting impact, keeping time in his head the resonance with which he’d become all too familiar in their shared past. Torbernite dove into a handstand, aiming to connect with Galena’s ankles, and Galena grabbed Torbernite’s, and the two rolled forward in a choreographed two-man somersault down the hill toward the site. At the foot of the hill, the fully fused Pitchblende sprang forth from a mass of light, slamming his two pairs of hands to the opening of the quickly deteriorating Sperrylite shaft.

“EVERYONE OUT OF THE SHAFT!” Pitchblende demanded, barely able to fit even his upper half inside the collapsing shaft. His arms bifurcated at the elbow, limiting his range of motion and preventing him from getting any further inside. His bright orange hair spiked up into a forked pompadour which mashed against the ceiling of the shaft, and he gnashed his teeth with vastly exposed gums. His eyes paired vertically, Galena’s to the left and Torbernite’s to the right, all four squinting as his entire body strained to keep the shaft open.

The fused Massicots, Litharges, Euxenites, and Monazites could only stare in abject horror, time freezing to a deafening standstill as they all fell apart into their constituents. The only one that did not unfuse was Minium, whose glare upon Pitchblende was one of finally understanding what each of them had truly done.

“WHAT ARE YOU STANDING AROUND FOR!” Pitchblende yelled, trying to gain further traction with his legs outside. “GET OUT OF HERE AND RE-FUSE, AND HELP FROM THE OUTSIDE!”

“But Sperrylite–” a Monazite started.

“LEAVE SPERRYLITE TO THE  _LEAD TETRAOXIDE_.”

Everything burned with urgency in his head, everything overwhelming. Fusing in the past had only the threat of taboo hanging over it. They’d done it for thrills, for companionship, even practiced to get used to the foreign body. But this, this was a matter of life or death. Pitchblende  _had_ to succeed in this,  _had_ to get everyone to safety.  _Everyone_ , including both nascent gems. There was no other option. He refused to have casualties on his watch, and would sooner– no, it wouldn’t come to that. The third rock slide that had begun in the ceiling of the Sperrylite shaft threatened to bear down on Pitchblende even harder, and he temporarily freed one arm so each of its two hands could go to the small of his back and his abdomen and retrieve Galena’s and Torbernite’s respective gem tools. Before he lost his grip on the caving rock, the knuckleduster and the switchblade had fused just as Pitchblende had, and he slammed the resulting heavy-handled, forked-blade push-knife into the high end of the right wall to gain leverage.

The unfused gems took the display as a threat and scattered out to either side of Pitchblende soon after, but Minium looked at his hook and chicken sickle for a moment before focusing and trying to fuse them all together, resulting in a set of three hooks mounted to a handle. A digging katar. With a newfound and simple resolve, he turned about face and proceeded to continue digging blindly toward the nascent gem.

“I’LL COME BACK FOR YOU,” Pitchblende insisted, easing the falling rock to render a pocket which would not crush Minium. Then he ducked out of the Sperrylite shaft, and split his unique push-knife into its two constituent halves, using them as a pair of oversized pitons to scale the rock face and inspect the state of the Litharge shaft.

The three Galenas had fused to try to bust through to the new Litharge with their combined knuckleduster strength, but it wasn’t enough, and Pitchblende rose to the mouth of the shaft just in time to see them fall apart in exhaustion. The four fused Massicots and one fused Euxenite turned around to find the alien voice from down below had come from the gem fusion now staring them all down, and they followed suit unfusing, but instead in fear.

Pitchblende looked down at the quarry to see the workers all gathering around in uncertain chaos, and he recognized there were new faces among the triplicate fusions that had re-formed outside. Some of the Orpiments had fused with Litharges, forming sallow but stalwart Glaucodots, and were fast to scaling the cliffside to add their hook-and-rope fused weapons to the integrity of the community net-work of rope the four- and five-deep Orpiments had set up to hold back the quarry face. In a brief dialectic he mentally committed to being able and unable to tackle both shaft rescues at once, but ultimately logic left the top shaft in order to secure the bottom shaft, and he dove back down to leave the Litharge shaft rescue to the new faces in the quarry, digging out the cave-in to try to resume helping the Minium however he could.

The three Realgars had noticed the chaos, the eldest of the three red brothers of Orpiment sensing it was nearly time for not one but two new gems to emerge, and had come to the observation hill on bated breath. It was a Realgar’s skill specific to his specimen type, to be able to glean the class and capabilities of a given gem just from their cut and appearance, and the eldest R-43 was singularly skilled in this ability. R-40 and R-42 flanked R-43 to either side, all three of them knowing Realgar was not a physical, working class gem. R-43 watched the Glaucodots scale the crumbling cliffside and understood the solution they represented. R-40 and R-42 stayed behind with a speechless Pallasite as R-43 approached two unfused Orpiments and took a hand with each of his own. In an outright breach of class he initiated a cross-specimen fusion with them, and they dare not question his directive as they combined into the four-limbed and elegant, cerulean blue Lavendulan. The two Orpiments’ eyes had remained cyclopean, directly above Lavendulan’s jutting, bulbous nose, but similarly to the five-deep Orpiments had also retained the pupils of both Orpiment specimens; Realgar’s pair of eyes lie just above the Orpiments’ one, Realgar’s gem right in the middle of Lavendulan’s forehead displacing the eyes slightly downward. With the self-doubt of the Orpiments and the urgency of a Realgar came the knowing impulse to pull all three lengths of rope from the deep red forehead gem and the pair of golden yellow Orpiment gems vertically aligned at his chest, intuitively weaving their ends together into a monkey’s fist. He gracefully swung the line up to the top of the cliff face, hooking it in a fork in the rock so that he might scale to the head of the rock slide, then upon gaining footing at the top, slung the monkey’s fist down to hook in the ropes of the Orpiments and Glaucodots. Once he had his lines secured, he rappelled down to the ground level, having formed a parallel rope ladder of sorts by which the Litharge shaft gems could descend safely.

By the time the Litharge shaft was evacuated, one of the Monazites had the new Litharge in hand, yet unformed, and another massive sheet of the quarry face sheared off, crashing down and taking all the Orpiments and Glaucodots with it. Dozens upon dozens of poofed gems scattered everywhere in the resultant rock slide, and Lavendulan recoiled his tool in stupefied shock as he felt like he’d failed. A silence soon had fallen over the quarry finally, but a rustling was heard as the rubble seemed to be settling at the mouth of the Sperrylite tunnel. The two Orpiments and Litharge that had fused into Minium emerged, holding the poofed gems of tabular Torbernite and cubic Galena, Pitchblende not having survived the rock slide in one piece. All three had something in hand, however, and the second Orpiment produced a platinum white gemstone to Lavendulan before all three of them collapsed at his feet, the Orpiment with Sperrylite in hand poofing as he fell, having endured too great a damage.

Sperrylite began to take physical form, and Lavendulan fell apart back into two Orpiments and Realgar. Realgar knelt in deferent awe as she stood, the two Orpiments falling prostrate behind him as they realized what was taking place. R-43 looked up, speechless at her gauzy, ethereal form. Sperrylite, a platinum arsenide, and the first  _stable_  gem the asteroid had ever produced.


	3. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Realgar R-43 seeks closure, and provides some solace in return.

Mortified of the conditions under which Sperrylite had first taken physical form, Mystic Topaz and her cabinet had quickly swept her away to their pavilion to speak in private.

“My luster, it is so fortuitous to make your acquaintance,” Pallasite began, lowering her head with its rounded hairstyle as she subtly at the same time lowered her pastel green rebozo to cover her mid-drift in the new gem’s presence.

“Such a choice of words,” Sperrylite fluttered pleasingly, parting her long, smoky hair to look up at her with her single, charcoal colored, deep-set eye. “I would only be so lucky to emerge into the company of such an intuitive lot.”

When Pallasite choked up at the perceived compliment, Mystic Topaz pulled her back by the shoulder.

“We apologize for the… tumultuous events of your formation. You won’t need to remain here on AG9KF07 for long. Blue Diamond has expressed wishes to meet you personally upon your emergence.”

“I suppose it is fitting that I was birthed amid chaos,” the pyrite-class gem smiled, letting her hair fall back into its long, slender style down her small frame. “Is it not?”

“Do you always speak in riddles?” Schorl mumbled offhandedly, trying her best to stifle any confused irritation in her voice.

Mystic Topaz shot her a brief, wide-eyed snarl of incredulity, but just as quickly regained her composure.

“As a pyrite-class gem, it’s ingrained in her,” Pallasite insisted, trying to be prideful of this regal gem before her, prideful that she had been midwife to this new specimen which the Empire had never before seen. “You mean to say that you already know your native skill, don’t you, my luster?”

“And you mean to say that you do as well.” She shrugged coyly. “Only time will tell. There’s a chance I’m completely useless to the Empire.”

“Sperrylite’s ability is probability manipulation, Mystic Topaz,” Pallasite explained graciously, smiling nervously. She had acted as interpreter for yet emerged gems for an eternity, but to act as one for one already emerged? Barely, she didn’t mention that she was quickly becoming unsure whether the cryptic gem was worth their Diamond’s time. “We might be able to affect the odds in our favor, and overpower the rebellion at last.”

“Now that.” Mystic Topaz tightened her posture even straighter. “Such a skill is certainly… something which Blue Diamond’s court is best equipped to make use of. You’ll be surely be amenable with her counsel, for certain.”

“Nothing is certain,” Sperrylite replied lightly. “Though, with effort things might be  _likely_. Before I leave, however–I would like to meet the gems responsible for my emergence. My existence neither was natural nor came without difficulty.”

The group of high-ranking gems all sputtered uselessly for a moment, even Peacock Pearl, who hid behind her adamantine Topaz.

“–My luster, they–”

Schorl stepped in, digging her heels together in a strict posture.

“Most of the facet which gave way to you collapsed in your emergence. There were casualties.”

Sperrylite didn’t hesitate to turn away from them with detached interest, walking out of the pavilion and making her way out into the quarry.

“And yet the gems that brought me from the rock face still survived. What are the odds?”

The stable gem came across a catastrophic amount of debris in the aftermath of what had taken place shortly prior. Orpiments, litharges, and massicots had begun to reform and immediately move to clearing the rubble–though it was apparent from numerous deformities, a marked number of them had clearly been cracked in the rockslide. The three Realgars, the only remaining high-ranking figures, stood at the observation hill, with the Realgar in the center of them holding the Galena and Torbernite that had fused. Sperrylite approached them, wondering why they were not supervising the kindergarten cleanup.

“Sperrylite,” R-40 to the left began, not turning to her. “As the Realgars who oversaw your emergence, we know your skill. If you’re going to stay here, you shouldn’t tell any of them–” he motioned down to the quarry, “–that you could have prevented this.”

“Really, you’re not wanted here,” R-42 to the right seconded. “I don’t care what use you might be to our Diamond. Another of your would have inevitably formed, under different circumstances than this.”

“But the universe had to form me now. My timing was pivotal, from what I gather,” she replied unfeelingly. “You and the others here are most useful here on this asteroid. But it’s a reliable wager to believe I’ll be most useful elsewhere. Before I leave this place, I wanted to meet the ones who brought me from the facet.”

“You were birthed from a fever dream,” the middle Realgar, R-43, replied, least capable of hiding the scorn in his voice. “Those whose hands played a role do not exist.”

“Unlikely. Who were they?”

R-43 turned around, and though his brothers offered to take the dormant gems from him, he held them close.

“They were fusions, my luster. Fusions that were not of the same specimen. There were so many, I could not possibly know all their names.” He looked over to a group of Orpiments knotting up a pile of rocks to be hefted away in one pass. “I just know one of them was Lavendulan. It… was pure chaos. Nothing like this has ever happened before. But you know that. You desired it.”

Sperrylite smiled, nearly cruelly.

“Lavendulan,” she repeated. “You know this name because you met Lavendulan here today?”

“Being part of Lavendulan was a nonstop panic. It was a dreadful feeling, the compulsion to fuse with… the common Orpiment.”

“But Lavendulan did what neither Realgar nor Orpiment were capable of!”

“It felt  _terrible_. It haunts me.”

“Surely it can’t have been so bad. Perhaps, under different circumstances, you might find in time Lavendulan could be of future use to your kindergarten here. You might even find in time that you  _like_  being Lavendulan.”

“Did you come here simply to spout nonsense and vulgarity at us?” R-42 barked, pulling R-43 behind him and glaring at her. “Leave!”

She stepped nearer, brushing her hair out of one side of her face to peer behind R-42 to lock gazes with the seething R-43.

“What do you have there in your hands?” She smiled. “A Galena and… a Torbernite? Why are you protecting them, rather than supervising the kindergarten in the Adamantine’s absence?”

R-43 brushed his brother aside, glowering tiredly at the gems in his hands.

“These two. I. I want to understand.”

“These, too, formed fusion, then? What do you stand to gain once they re-form?”

“You aren’t owed the right to grant us gratitude. We owe you nothing, not even an explanation. If anything, you owe us the lives you cost.”

“It was… unfortunate, if anyone were shattered just so I could be here. But surely I owe all of you gratitude for all you did to bring me into the universe. I could have come from any stony-iron asteroid, but I came from yours.”

“With your skill, can you bring back our fallen and mend our cracked?”

“I am no healer, and you three as Realgars know this. But, you also know that anything can happen.”

And before they knew it, Sperrylite had vanished before them in a momentary glitch of light.

“An abomination,” R-40 spat in horror, the demonstration leaving him feeling like she might reappear at any moment. “She wanted it this way.”

“Put her out of your mind, and focus on overseeing the retrieval of survivors.”

“R-43, you mean for the two of us to leave you here?”

“I want to be here when these two reawaken.”

“So be it.”

“43, know we do not think you lesser for what you did before,” R-42 remarked. “More would likely have shattered had you not formed Lavendulan. You did what you had to do.”

“The most terrifying thing of all was that I  _must_  have.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Torbernite was first to reform, with Galena shortly after. Both immediately jerked to attention at seeing the disaster before them.

“Welcome back to the land of the living,” Realgar R-43 greeted, watching them from behind. He had begun to pace restlessly as he waited, and taken them further off, past the observation hill. The notion that he would have to confront his superiors regarding his actions during the disaster left him just as uncomfortable as thinking about the act itself. “I was beginning to worry. It’s been nearly eighteen hours now.”

Torbernite looked to Galena, and hugged him fiercely, not easily letting go. Galena simply leaned into it further with malaise, welcoming the comfort of proximity to his superior.

“I saw the two of you fuse. The way you sprang into the disaster, you’ve formed that fusion before, haven’t you?”

The two untangled immediately, and Torbernite shoved Galena back with arms out to either side.

“You’re not separating him from my command,” he started, brow furrowed intently. “This doesn’t concern you.”

“Doesn’t it, though? You’re the only ones on this asteroid who have experienced this before today.” The exhaustion in the aristocratic arsenide’s voice seeped out more intensely as he smiled. “Do you know just how many heterogeneous fusions your sum presence catalyzed here? A few might have been purely accidental, but I witnessed from the hill just how many Massicots fused on purpose with Litharges. Just how many Litharges intentionally fused with Orpiments. And the two of you, you’re not even the same class of gem. What did you even  _form_?”

“We were Pitchblende,” Galena defied, still feeling like the two of them were under a magnifying glass. “What the slag do you want with  _Pitchblende_?”

“You–” Realgar stepped forward cautiously, his tone changing. “You’re cracked, aren’t you Galena?”

Torbernite whipped around to scrutinize his partner in concern, holding him by the shoulders.

“I’m fine,” he mumbled, avoiding eye contact.

“G-82, you’re not fine.” The chartreuse gem held Galena’s chin and made him look at him. Once they met gazes, Torbernite’s face went slack in denial that Realgar was right. “Your facial proportion’s skewed.”

“It’s just a hairline crack. I’ll be fine.”

“You’re staying with me,” Torbernite continued, getting increasingly stressed.

“I know you. You’re blaming yourself over this, A2X. I’m a soft gemstone, and I didn’t shatter today. I survived this. And you know–” He twitched, feeling the right side of his face skew slightly further around toward the back, his right eye enlarging and the hair on that side receding. He cleared his voice. “–And you know that if we hadn’t done what we did, the whole facet would have shattered pretty much everyone.”

“–I know.” Torbernite swallowed the hurt of seeing the aftershocks of the fray.

“Pitchblende. You want to know about Pitchblende.  _Why?_ ” In his distress, Galena was grasping to focus on something besides his condition.

“I fused with two Orpiments,” the Realgar confessed. “We formed  _Lavendulan_. Even in all the time that’s passed since the rock slide, I still can’t wrap my head around everything I felt occupying the same space, the same body–”

“–You sought closure from us?” Torbernite cut him off, growing more irate and less understanding. “We aren’t arsenides. We don’t know what it’s like to feel like an arsenide, let alone the differences between you.”

“…You know what it’s like to feel like a sulfide,” Galena started sheepishly. “And I know what it’s like to feel like a phosphate. And we both know what it’s like to be an oxide… and none of those, too, if you want to be poetic about it.”

Torbernite flushed neon green in the face and straightened up, eyes wide.

“Yes, well–”

“Fascinating,” Realgar commented, fully attentive.

“Fascinating? That’s all you can say about it?” Torbernite was struggling to pinpoint the correct reaction to the course of events paired with the conversation. “You don’t think Mystic Topaz will have us broken over this?”

“What do you want me to say?” Realgar defended, frowning. “We’re all under the same threat, should she do anything about it. I am so new to the mere notion of it all. How could you have possibly known you were capable of fusing in the first place?”

“We didn’t,” Galena replied, fighting through another tic. “We just… tried.”

“It took a lot of practice,” Torbernite added, rubbing his face. “We don’t move the same at all.”

“I think… it’s got to be what stability feels like,” Galena continued, increasingly distracted and whimsical. “My leadenness against his radioactivity. We couple each other… so well…”

The two of them looked to him, picking up on his shifting tone of voice.

“Galena, look at me.”

“Torbernite, I’m fine.” Galena’s dark chin-length hair had nearly completely receded off the right side of his head, and his right eye was now nearly triple the size of the left.

“You’d be fine if you were a trashcan,” the chartreuse phosphate joked pointedly. “You’re a sulfide. Galena. And you’re  _not_  fine.”

Galena glanced downward and put a hand to his gut-positioned cubic gem, its point jutting out like a navel, then looked out at the rubble again.

“I… need to ingest something,” he muttered quietly, starting off toward the quarry again. “The starlight isn’t enough.”

Torbernite reached out for him, but Realgar grabbed him before he could connect the grip.

“Let him go. Keep an eye on him, but let him go. Fractures magnify compulsions. Galenas inherently scrutinize material composition: that’s their skill, it’s what they do. The fracture… is simply making him seek to do this with his mouth and not his hands. Keep an eye on him. If you care for him, it’s the best you can do for him.”

“How are you so certain what’s going to happen with his crack?” Torbernite turned the conversation back on Realgar in a desperation to get control of the situation. “What do  _you_  know about fractures?”

“I don’t believe you’d emerged, the last time there was a fatal accident on AG9KF07. …I’m R-43, and my brothers are R-40 and R-42. R-41 is not at another facet of this asteroid. He was deep in the shaft of a trapped Euxenite when it collapsed. The cave-in happened so quickly. There was nothing anyone could do. The Euxenite was shattered in the process, but R-41 made it out in one piece. It wasn’t long before he was in… several… pieces.” Realgar’s face fell long and withdrawn. “His fractures ran far deeper than your friend’s. It was clear R-41 was not going to survive the day. G-82… Go to him, keep an eye on him. I can assure you that his crack isn’t fatal.”

“So that’s why excavation halts when Realgars enter a shaft. …I’m sorry to hear that you lost one of your cut.”

“Don’t be. I got to tell him goodbye.” He wiped tears away with a gloved hand. “Go on. I’ll go back to R-40 and R-42, if you’ll go on to G-82. As his supervisor, and his friend… you owe him your attentiveness.”


	4. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Torbernite A2X takes Galena G-82 to the tailings margin, to hide him from Mystic Topaz. But Galena finds he's not alone.

Torbernite located G-82 wandering detachedly through the commotion of tallow Orpiments hefting away rubble. Galena would pick up smaller pieces of debris, absently avoiding being in the way of progress, and putting them to his mouth to test them; some, he would drop, but others, he would toss his head back slightly askew to swallow. One of the golden arsenides stumbled over the lead sulfide gem and was about to lash out in outcry for not appearing to be aiding in disaster recovery, but he parted his long thick bangs with his free hand and his jaw slacked, his lone eye recognizing he’d been about to yell at a damaged gem. He set down his pile of tethered rocks, about to offer help if Galena needed it, but Torbernite put a hand on the shorter gem’s shoulder.

“Thank you, Orpiment. I’ll take care of it.” The chartreuse phosphate motioned for him to continue at his task. Torbernite couldn’t hide the desperate look on his face as the Orpiment resummoned his length of rope and resumed hefting away the same pile of debris. He rubbed at his birthmarked chin for a moment before kneeling down to offer a chunk of rock to Galena about the size of his fist. “Is this a better one?”

On all fours at that moment, Galena glanced first at the rock, then up to his superior with a glaze of distraction, then back to the rock. He took it without comment and put it to his mouth, then after a moment decided it was satisfactory enough to swallow it, distorting his lips with a minor amount of shapeshifting in order to do so.

“This is not a good place to be… doing this,” Torbernite began, offering an empty hand this time, suggesting that he help Galena to his feet. “It’s impeding cleanup and casualty count, Galena.”

Galena took his hand and followed behind him as Torbernite tried to get him somewhere safer.

“The rubble here. It’s… it’s quality rubble.”

“I understand that. But.” How could Torbernite understand that? “You need to focus, Galena.”

“It’s… difficult.”

“You  _need_  to.”

“I can focus on ore,” Galena tried. It was like fighting through dense smoke.

“Do you want to go to the tailings?”

“Tailings.” Galena nodded quietly, though Torbernite couldn’t see it.

“I’ll take you there. There’s a lot of different material there for you to… inspect. I need to do something first, but I’ll take you right there afterward. But you have to stay with me, all right?”

“Tailings.” The mere mention certainly had his attention.

“Ah! J7HL,” Torbernite called out to another Torbernite, who was entering the  UN28474 kindergarten, urging both for him to approach them and for Galena to keep up as he closed the gap. The other Torbernite had a rounded visor, and no visible birthmark on his face or elsewhere, his gem located at his chest. “Not who I was looking for, but I’m so relieved to see you.”

“A2X!” The other Torbernite recognized him immediately and ran to them through the muddle of workers. “What happened? We could feel the rock slide at ‘76!”

“There was a shaft shear. It took the entire face of the kindergarten down with it. I, my Galena,” he started, trying to divert talk about the enormity of the disaster to something more personal. “One of my Galenas was cracked. I’m taking him someplace safe until the kindergarten calms down.”

“Is there anything I can do?” The look J7HL gave A2X was one of understanding.

“You have impeccable timing,” A2X started, grateful his kin was eager to provide assistance, and did not require much convincing. “I was just looking for someone to take my place for a few hours here. I have not located my other three Galenas, and they were all in one of the two shafts involved in the collapse. I can’t keep G-82 safe and look for the others at the same time. His fracture… He’s prone to wandering and distraction, to put it lightly.”

“Tailings,” Galena repeated quietly, trying to focus on following orders.

“Yes, G-82. Patience.”

“You’re taking him to the tailings margin?” J7HL remarked, nodding affirmatively and taking in Galena’s behavior. “There’s plenty there to keep him occupied, provided he doesn’t get caught up in following back an Orpiment.”

“He’ll be fine for a few hours,” A2X insisted. “So you’ll help? I’ll return once I have G-82 someplace I’m confident he’ll be safe, and continue helping to recover specimens.”

“You’d do the same for my troupe,” J7HL replied in kind. “It’s… a disappointment that such a thing’s transpired. The enormity of the disaster is evident, that even a Torbernite’s statistical advantages couldn’t have kept your workers safe. Something truly horrific happened here today. –Forgive me, for running my mouth. I’m overwhelmed.” He motioned broadly to the scene in the near distance, his eyes locked on the commotion of the kindergarten. “My setting is heavy in the aftermath of all this. I can’t imagine how much heavier yours must be, having directly experienced it.”

They parted ways with J7HL as his seven Galenas caught up with him, filing behind and quickly becoming just as overwhelmed as their superior. G-82 could only gaze vacantly at them as they walked past he and A2X. They tried their best not to stare at his warped physical form, though the last in file rubbernecked in worried horror, as though G-82′s condition signified the least of the damages they were about to witness firsthand.

A2X led G-82 on foot to the tailings margin in silence. Galena could tell from his bare hand in Torbernite’s that something was amiss with the lack of conversation.

“…Are  _you_  all right? …Cracked?”

“I’m not cracked,” Torbernite replied tersely, fiercely inside his own head. “I’m just. I can’t stop thinking about what happened. What J7HL just said to me. My other Galenas. It happened because I wasn’t Torbernite during the rock slide. It happened because I was Pitchblende.”

A long silence resumed, Galena’s head drooping for some time.

“ _We_  were Pitchblende,” Galena corrected. “And we saved a lot of lives.” He fought through a tic. “–They’re from my cut. I feel responsible, too, A2X.”

“We could have done so much more,” Torbernite continued, stopping in place and staring off at the horizon of the asteroid.

“If we hadn’t acted when we did, it would have been worse.”

“I couldn’t save my own Galenas.”

“You don’t know yet if they shattered. They could be fine.”

“You’re lying through your teeth, but I know you’re trying to make me feel better so I’ll forgive it.” Torbernite flashed him a plaster smile. “I shouldn’t be unloading all this on you like this. With you like this.”

“I want you to be okay, too.”

“I’ll–!” Torbernite became animated again, taking Galena the rest of the way to the tailings margin. “I’ll be okay, so long as you stay here, and stay out of trouble. Can you do that for me?” His question was met with further silence.

The tailings margin was once the oldest kindergarten on the asteroid, centuries long since abandoned. It hadn’t produced nascent gems in even longer, and as a result the other newer kindergartens had taken to dumping their tailings into it in an attempt to salvage some usefulness of it. The canyon was getting to be decently full already, five other productive kindergartens all contributing to the mounting garbage rock. Torbernite guided Galena down a narrow path and to a small fork in the rock face.

“G-82, you are to stay here. And you are not to speak to or engage anyone else. I will return for you once the other Galenas are accounted for. Have I made myself clear?”

“–Crystal clear.”

“Good.” Torbernite gave him a peck on the forehead, more to steel himself than to reassure Galena. “I think it might be good if you tried to focus on the specific composition of the rocks that suit your tastes. Might help keep your mind sharp.”

“Tailings,” Galena chirped, already eyeing the rubble behind Torbernite.

As Torbernite walked off back to UN28474 alone, he hollowly mumbled to himself, “You’re all I have left, Galena.”

After some time vacantly browsing the tailings rubble for good specimens, Galena recalled Torbernite’s suggestion to be mindful of why he was picking the rocks. He seemed to be favoring legitimate ore samples–lead, silver, cadmium, copper, the list went on–but, the possibility that he could be ingesting shattered gems would not quit his mind no matter how ravenously he shoveled debris.

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ 

“It’s been too long since I went to see G-82,” Torbernite A2X began. “I promise I’ll be brief. I just… I need to check on him.”

“I understand,” Realgar R-43 replied. “I’ll tend your Galenas. It’s a quiet day besides. We can handle things in your absence.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much.”

It was by some grace of the Diamonds that Torbernite had not been shattered for the insubordinate fashion he’d commandeered attempts to avert the Sperrylite rock slide all those years ago. Though all three had survived, he’d had his troupe of Galenas stripped of him and transferred to the command of J7HL. Mystic Topaz had permitted him the lowest rung as entry management for the newest emerged Galenas, and on that day they numbered six. They didn’t know why their Torbernite went missing hours at a time, but they didn’t pry.

It wasn’t supposed to have been a permanent arrangement to leave Galena at the tailings margin, but solutions seemed beyond reach. The first few times, Torbernite had felt rather silly, carrying a chunk of ore to the margin not so unlike the Orpiments wandering out and back. He’d left G-82 there since the disaster, to protect him. Torbernite even now was convinced that had he not kept Galena safe there, Topaz would have had them  _both_ broken–but he’d insisted to her that G-82 had been shattered in the rock slide, and that he couldn’t even find a trace of him the remnants must have been so small. And she’d either believed him, or not felt a lowly Galena was worth her energy.

“I brought you a piece of antimony, Galena,” Torbernite began, rounding the corner of the canyon fork with a vague smile.

It had been a long time since Galena’d had the capacity to move much, his form clustered and lumpy, not resembling much of anything these days. Torbernite put a hand to Galena’s skeletal gem setting and looked up where he last recalled a face existing.

He was still in there. Good.

Torbernite offered up the ore and it vanished into Galena’s mouth. He picked up a few pieces of tailing from the drift out in the main track of the canyon, and offered them up as well to similar effect.

“They put me in charge of a new troupe of Galenas. I know I’ve told you. Six of them. But it’s just not the same. It will  _never_  be the same.”

Galena had become a very good listener.

“Slag it all, I wish there were healers on this garbage rock. I’ve heard they can mend cracks and cure all kinds of afflictions. …If only I could make a run for the warp pad. I’d figure out how to bring a healer back here. A  _Beryl_. Or a  _Rose Quartz_. She’d know what to do.” Torbernite shrank into a sigh, feeding Galena another rock. “I just… can’t do it. Not without knowing I could be guaranteed to come back. I can’t leave you alone like this. An unstable gem has never used a warp pad before. Even if it’s possible for one of us to use it, what’s to say hospitality would be on the other side sooner than hostility?”

He started pacing.

“I don’t even know if my gem skill would work on other celestial bodies. I’d probably get myself lost. …Galena, I’m lost without you at the kindergarten. Coming out here to see you is one of the only things that gives me footing, gives me direction. Focus.”

“Focus.”

Muffled, and scarcely enunciated, Torbernite had felt it had been an echo at first, but he noticed Galena trying to shift in place, and he moved to assist, pushing Galena’s distended form so that Galena could turn on his side.

“I’d do anything for you. Anything at all. …I love you, G-82. I always will.”

“ _Focus_.”

Torbernite took the repetition the only way he could, wiping away tears with a nod and smile.

“I’m going to get back to UN28474 for now, all right? I just… needed to check on you.”

He put a hand to the memory of Galena’s face, and put his lips to it as he always had, then went on his way.

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

The last thing Galena remembered was regurgitating a massive amount of tailings. Had he been eating tailings? How did he even get out here in the tailings margin? His head uneasy, he shakily surveyed his surroundings, only to feel another life form grab his feet. Startled, he began to back away, but found himself against the rock face, forced to confront the other figure directly.

He got a better look, and determined this was another gem. At least, he assumed it was. He’d never known a gem to have four arms instead of a pair of arms and a pair of legs. A row of odd tendrils the same color as its taupe body seemed analogous to hair, with one also to each side of its face. There was an opaque, metallic baguette-cut gem at its throat. Its dark bodysuit cut away in a diamond shape across its torso, and formed irregular bands down its limbs. He’d met gems stable and unstable alike, and he could not determine which this individual might be. One lock of its hair stretched outward toward his face, parting away his asymmetrical hair so it could make eye contact as it crawled up even closer upon him.

“–I, have we met?” He flustered deeply when it put one of its lower hands to his stomach.

“I don’t think I’ve ever met  _anyone_  before,” it replied, smitten.

“I… I think you just… came out of me–”

“–Should I not have?”

“–I don’t understand.” Galena sank onto his back, flushing a deep leaden blue in the face as the other gem got on top of him outright. “What  _are_  you?”

“I’m Dyscrasite. What do you want me to be?” It glanced down at him inquisitively.

“Is a– Dyscrasite… Are you stable? Unstable?”

“I don’t understand.”

“–Neither do I. How did we get out here? How long have I been here?”

“I don’t know how you got out here. I don’t know how I got out, either. You seem upset that I’m out here,” it began, leaning in closer to put two hands to his mouth. “Should I not be out here? I can go back in if you want–”

“–No!” He swatted its hands away, then squared his shoulders, squinting his eye shut. “Please get off of me.”

Dyscrasite pushed off into a handstand–but wouldn’t any standing have been a handstand for it?–and crawled up the rock face behind Galena. As he watched from where he lay, he realized that it had the ability to scale the wall as though connecting with gravity at that angle. He wondered what skills that ability might possibly facilitate, and came up with nothing. Hanging head-down from the wall, Dyscrasite watched Galena.

“What are  _you_?”

“I’m a Galena. UN28474-G-82. Unstable. Sulfide. Cubi–” He put a hand to his abdomen as he spoke, and cut off abruptly as he traced the shape of his gem. “ _Cubic_. I’m not cracked anymore.” His hands followed the contours of his arms, chest, neck, and face, both awed and distressed at his now cyclopean countenance. “I remember bits and pieces. I remember I was cracked. My superior brought me out here. But I don’t remember  _you_. Did you heal me?”

“I only just emerged. I don’t remember anything either. Stable. Unstable.” It got stuck on those words again, thoughtful. “ _Mutable_. I’m mutable.”

“You really did come out of me, didn’t you?” Galena couldn’t understand, let alone come to terms with it. “Did I swallow you instead of a rock? How did you get dumped out here with the other tailings? Surely someone would have noticed a poofed gem.”

Dyscrasite shook its head, crawling back down the wall and laying down beside Galena.

“I came from inside you. There was nothing before.”

“How does that even work? Surely you just don’t remember. Gems don’t germinate inside other gems.”

“I did,” Dyscrasite replied. Again it hooked the corners of his mouth with its fingers. “Are you sure you don’t want me back inside? It was nice.”

“–I’h hather noh,” Galena mumbled, staring imploringly at the naive and heavy-lidded gem to get a handle on its personal space issues.

When it let go, he grabbed two of its wrists and dragged it to stand up with him. It flipped up into a handstand on his shoulders, thinking the gesture a game.

“I don’t want you to get back inside of me because things don’t belong in there,” he explained as he walked, surveying the debris-filled canyon for ways out. Dyscrasite balanced on his shoulders effortlessly. “Besides, I think we both benefit from you being… out here.” He trailed off on the last two words, a description alien to him in its context. “You’re really good at climbing. Can you go to the top of this drift of tailings and see if you can see anything? Maybe a way out of here?”

Without hesitation it flipped off him and onto the drift, crawling up and looking around once at the top. It cartwheeled one way, then the other, then came back down and hugged onto his back with all four arms.

“Can’t you climb too?”

“No. I need a path out.”

“There’s not one.”

“–There has to be one. Torbernite has been coming here.”

“You remember Torbernite coming here?”

“It’s one of few things I do remember. There has to be a way out, because he has a way  _in_.”

Dyscrasite vaulted off him and cartwheeled over to a line of emergence shafts.

“Maybe the way in’s not there now,” it wondered, peering into them. “What are these holes for?”

“…Gems come from rock faces. Those are emergence shafts.”

“But I came from inside you,” it objected curiously, crawling inside one in a higher row, one which was slightly too small, and it curled into the shaft’s contours. “Are you sure all of these holes had gems in them? Where are the gems now, then?”

“They’re at other kindergartens now, helping other gems emerge. Of course all these shafts were made by gems– Wait.” He went down the wall and scrutinized every hole. “Maybe one of these holes didn’t have a gem in it. Maybe one’s not a shaft, but a tunnel.”

“Why do you want to go away from here? What if Torbernite comes back?”

Galena stopped, and looked up to where Dyscrasite was lounging in the emergence shaft.

“This is a place for garbage. Discarded things. We don’t belong here.”

“Does that mean Torbernite discarded you?”

“No, he–” Galena choked up at the invasive, unintentionally pointed way the remark had been phrased. “He was hiding me.”

“Then we can keep hiding.” Dyscrasite climbed up into another hole higher still, this time one that had been for a gem bigger than itself. “You should try a hole. It’s nice.”

Galena could find no means nor reason to object, and he humored it. He came across a ground-level hole that looked like it had been one for a Galena and he crawled into it. It wasn’t long before he found Dyscrasite crawling into the shaft after him and curling up with him.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he started quietly, finding some solace in feeling defeated. “It was lonely.”

“You’re glad I’m here,” it repeated in a relaxed purr, putting its head in the space between his shoulder and neck. “Not lonely.”

They drifted off to sleep there, tangled up in each other like they had known each other for centuries.


End file.
